The War in North Africa and Europe

Soon after the United States entered the war, the western Allies
decided that their essential military effort was to be
concentrated in Europe, where the core of enemy power lay, while
the Pacific theater was to be secondary.

In the spring and summer of 1942, British forces were able to
break the German drive aimed at Egypt and push German General
Erwin Rommel back into Libya, ending the threat to the Suez
Canal, which connected the Mediterranean to the Red Sea.

On November 7, 1942, an American army landed in French North
Africa, and after hard-fought battles, inflicted severe defeats
on Italian and German armies. The year 1942 was also the turning
point on the Eastern Front, where the Soviet Union, suffering
immense losses, stopped the Nazi invasion at the gates of
Leningrad and Moscow, and defeated the German forces at
Stalingrad.

In July 1943 British and American forces invaded Sicily, and by
late summer the southern shore of the Mediterranean was cleared
of Fascist forces. Allied forces landed on the Italian mainland,
and although the Italian government accepted unconditional
surrender, fighting against Nazi forces in Italy was bitter and
protracted. Rome was not liberated until June 4, 1944. While
battles were still raging in Italy, Allied forces made
devastating air raids on German railroads, factories and weapon
emplacements, including German oil supplies at Ploesti in
Romania.

Late in 1943 the Allies, after much debate over strategy, decided
to open a Western front to force the Germans to divert far larger
forces from the Russian front. U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower
was appointed Supreme Commander of Allied Forces in Europe.
After immense preparations, on June 6, 1944, the first
contingents of a U.S., British and Canadian invasion army,
protected by a greatly superior air force, landed on the beaches
of Normandy in northern France. With the beachhead established
after heavy fighting, more troops poured in, and many contingents
of German defenders were caught in pockets by pincer movements.
The Allied armies began to move across France toward Germany. On
August 25 Paris was liberated. At the borders of Germany, the
Allies were delayed by stubborn counteraction, but by February
and March 1945, troops advanced into Germany from the west, and
German armies fell before the Russians in the east. On May 8 all
that remained of the Third Reich surrendered its land, sea and
air forces.